Supplements for improving body composition should have at least one of the following two functions: 

1. enhance the positive effects sought in the particular phase of the diet being observed. For example, in a diet aimed at muscle anabolism, one should favour products that facilitate the increase in lean mass.
2. minimise the adverse effects of the current eating style. For example, again in the context of an anabolic diet, the high calorie and carbohydrate load could lead to excessive accumulation of fat mass or insulin resistance. The intake of products that hinder the process of converting carbohydrates into fat or enhance insulin function will allow this phase to be prolonged, as well as allow more calories and carbohydrates to be consumed than could be afforded without supplementation, thus taking full advantage of the benefits of the diet.

The supplements to be selected should therefore be chosen according to your current eating style (and the training regime you are following).

Supplements for the anabolic and metabolic restoration phases

  As far as the metabolic restoration phase is concerned, the aim of the diet is to increase cellular metabolic activity by acting on the leptin-grelin axis and the production of oxaloacetate, while the side effects one may incur in this phase are weight gain and insulin resistance. With regard to the first point, the significant caloric and glucidic load (thus increasing insulin secretion) can lead to an increase in body weight. This increase can be due either to an increase in body fat, an increase in muscle mass, or increased water retention. Carbohydrates, in fact, are notoriously rather hydrophilic, so an increased intake of carbohydrates may correspond, within limits of course, to an increased retention of water, with an increase in the water constituent in the body composition. Should the weight gain be dysfunctional to one’s goals, countermeasures will have to be taken. On the other hand, insulin resistance during this phase can be caused by a carbohydrate intake that exceeds peripheral management capacities. The latter also applies to anabolic diets, whereas weight gain should only be considered an adverse effect if the body composition tends to change in a direction that is dysfunctional to one’s goals. The supplements to be favoured are therefore those capable of enhancing insulin function, those that hinder the addition of new fat, those that increase metabolic activity, mainly with regard to basal metabolism, but also with regard to diet-induced thermogenesis and physical activity, and finally, those that enable the retention or accumulation, depending on one’s goals, of muscle mass.

Supplements for the catabolic phase

  The aim of this phase is weight loss by acting mainly on insulinemia and, more trivially, on bioenergetic mechanisms. The most frequent side effects of weight-loss diets are a reduction in cellular metabolic activity and, in the case of prolonged high-fat diets, insulin resistance. Decreased metabolic activity is due to the deleterious effects of a low-calorie or hypoglucidic diet on the leptin-grelin axis and oxaloacetate production, while insulin resistance is frequently due to an accumulation of medium-chain triglycerides in myocytes and their influence on IRS-associated PI-3 kinase. It should be noted that a purely protein diet, or almost a purely protein diet, is not at all feasible, except for very short periods. Such a diet, in fact, would expose the body to many problems including a drop in testosterone production, liver and kidney failure. Having discarded this hypothesis, therefore, a hypoglucidic diet will also have to be hyperlipidic by necessity. In the more frequent case of wanting to lose as much as possible only the fat component, while retaining skeletal muscle, a further side effect may be the excessive loss of the latter. In fact, although by means of an adequate, significant protein intake it is possible to minimise the loss of muscle mass during slimming diets, this will still very easily occur. The supplements to be preferred in the context of a catabolic diet are therefore those capable of hindering the reduction of metabolic activity (and, in some cases, even boosting metabolism), those boosting insulin function, those facilitating muscle mass retention and, finally, those facilitating weight loss.